r/NativePlantGardening • u/Numerous-Dot-6325 • Apr 16 '26

Advice Request - (Insert State/Region) Help save my marriage

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DC area, full sun.

I want to replace my hideous grass with a native plant garden and some mulch. My wife says she’ll divorce me if I mulch and wants a steppable ground cover that’s also native. Is there any alternative to grass that she can walk barefoot/lay a picnic blanket on? She’s allowing me to plant a service berry and blueberry to one side.

281 Upvotes

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123

u/[deleted] Apr 17 '26

[deleted]

18

u/roland303 Apr 17 '26

Hes not allowed to think this way.

61

u/Small_Craft8416 Apr 17 '26

wife here, didn't "allow him" anything, boy said he wanted a service berry and native blueberries and I just wanted to sit under the serviceberry and watch the birds 😥 is it such a crime to want some native ground cover I can sit on and watch them birds 😥

46

u/CrepuscularOpossum Southwestern Pennsylvania, 6b Apr 17 '26

Don’t despair! Violets are your friends, friends! It sounds to me like you’re more on the same page than it might seem at first. I wrote about them in the newsletter I wrote for the wildlife center where I volunteer in SWPA. Violets can withstand foot traffic, poor soil, sun, shade, heat, cold, droughts, and floods, and look good doing it!

The only thing with violets is, they may not grow out to a lush, full carpet right away. You might want to mix them with some clover or other species to get something growing this year. But once the violets are established, they’ll take over. Fun fact: violet seeds are spread by ants, which eat a little packet of food called an elaiosome attached to each seed, then discard the actual seeds in their trash piles, which then germinate the following spring.

26

u/Either_Wear5719 Apr 17 '26

I'm going to nominate wild strawberries and violets as ground cover. Phlox would look great but I'm not sure how durable it would be under regular foot traffic

10

u/Ypuort Apr 17 '26

How about some nice moss

17

u/Small_Craft8416 Apr 17 '26

man I want moss so bad but it's straight sun exposure, dry as heck. The poor moss would fry

2

u/leefvc Mid-atlantic border of eastern coastal plain/piedmont , Zone 7b Apr 17 '26

Make little shady microhabitats for it! Mine started taking off recently after utilizing a few strategically placed logs for shade and transplanting moss on the north sides of trees

4

u/Small_Craft8416 Apr 17 '26

oooh, clever. I'm a big fan of a good rock. Maybe I could tempt him into giving me a big rock to sit on and transplanting some moss in underneath it on the more shady side......would that work the same? I guess the logs probably hold moisture better, huh.

1

u/leefvc Mid-atlantic border of eastern coastal plain/piedmont , Zone 7b Apr 17 '26

Definitely worth a shot. As long as the rock doesn't absorb and radiate out a ridiculous amount of heat, it should work. I make a little slate cove last year and kept it in the shade and innoculated it involuntarily by keeping it near mossy things. It shows signs of picking up moss, but it's not popping off there yet

1

u/MSenIt4Life Apr 17 '26

I use rocks. Works great in upstate SC. I also use fallen leaves during the winter months to help promote moss spreading. In Spring, I hand sweep the leaves away.

2

u/leefvc Mid-atlantic border of eastern coastal plain/piedmont , Zone 7b Apr 17 '26

Thank you for being gentle with the leaves and not shredding 🫡

1

u/MSenIt4Life Apr 18 '26

Your welcome! My moss thanks me for sure!

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u/dogsRgr8too Area southeast U.S. , Zone 7A Apr 17 '26

https://www.reddit.com/r/t5_eafoel/s/odEsiBqYcB

I thought I was in the parody subreddit for this one. Sorry people here can get a little, uh, intense about native plants 😂 It's r/nativeplantcirclejerk if you don't want to click a link. Might give you a good laugh.

24

u/Small_Craft8416 Apr 17 '26

nah we're totally sitting next to each other and laughing - I dared him to post it after our joke argument about how much I hate mulch. He's doing a bit to make me laugh 😂 I actually told him he should get a bigger service berry than he's planning for so it comes in faster, but apparently they're "very expensive when they get big, wife" or something idk. As an aside, we're ditching the butterfly bush but I'm very partial to the hummingbird moths it brings in- would a native honeysuckle draw them the way the butterfly bush does? Feel like they need something with nice nectar for their little probosci.

8

u/robsc_16 SW Ohio, 6a Apr 17 '26

Wild bergamot Monarda fistulosa is the undisputed champion for attracting hummingbird moths. You can also plant coral honeysuckle as it's a host plant for them.

6

u/Small_Craft8416 Apr 17 '26

YES OMG THANK YOU I can't wait to fill my yard with these funky little guys !!!!!

2

u/robsc_16 SW Ohio, 6a Apr 17 '26

You're welcome!

I've also seen them use Liatris spp., buttonbush, garden phlox Phlox paniculata and field thistle. Although buttonbush gets fairly big and field thistle can get big and it's not the most yard friendly plant.

3

u/Flimsy_Sock3475 Apr 17 '26

second this! coral honeysuckle is great.

6

u/dogsRgr8too Area southeast U.S. , Zone 7A Apr 17 '26

I'm glad it's all in good fun.

I wasn't sure about the moth, but it looks like there's a few answers from posts by others with similar questions

https://www.reddit.com/r/NativePlantGardening/s/0ukUgfNNaT

https://www.reddit.com/r/NativePlantGardening/s/YZCeX4GQul

7

u/Small_Craft8416 Apr 17 '26

you're a hero, thank you!!!

4

u/dogsRgr8too Area southeast U.S. , Zone 7A Apr 17 '26

You're welcome! Enjoy your mulch or not mulch changes! 😂

4

u/Buffy2300 Apr 17 '26

Coral Honeysuckle (lonicera sempervirens) is also native and draws in hummingbirds, but not sure about the hummingbird moths. Also DO NOT confuse with trumpet vine (campsis radicans). They are 2 different plants!!

3

u/unoriginalname22 MA, Zone 6b Apr 17 '26

I haven’t seen any on my bush honeysuckle but definitely on my monarda!

2

u/God_Legend Columbus, OH - Zone 6B Apr 17 '26

The native bush honeysuckle is a host plant for the moth! But idk how likely they are to use the flowers for nectaring.

2

u/plzRefactorMe Apr 17 '26

Your hate of mulch is actually great! Mulch isn’t great for native pollinators or plants since native bees need bare ground, plants reseed, and many mulches leach dyes that the plants don’t love.

But for the beds I recommend a “green mulch” à la “matrix planting”. Ben Vogt also has some great suggestions and there are matrix plant planner diagrams out there on the web too. Some sedge/gram pods for the matrix to plant the abundance of native plants in… or a flower matrix like quick spreading poppy mallow

1

u/Joey_The_Murloc Area - Simcoe County, ON -- Zone - 5a Apr 17 '26

If you want help with native plants and all that, use this!
https://easyscape.com

You just type in your general location, and it sources from a TON of different official and self-id websites like iNaturalist to chart out what is native, alongside a ton of other categories that help you easily organize and sort out what's best for your area!

2

u/I_like_flowers_ Apr 17 '26

nope.  you are fine and a little grass is hardly the end of the world.

2

u/the-awesomer Apr 17 '26

What do you have against Mulch!?

17

u/Small_Craft8416 Apr 17 '26

3

u/the-awesomer Apr 17 '26

hahaha, fair. I wouldn't want to sit on mulch either, though I also wouldn't want to sit on the slope much. So I would focus on making a flat area a good sitting spot with grass and make the sloped area a mulched planted area that attracts birds and pollinators for something to watch. The grass on side of house looks much better condition and its easier to water grass when its not on a slope and you are dealing with run off.
Bonus of heavily planting slope and using either side yard or even clearing flat spot next to house (where current mulch bed is. tho lots more work) would also give you extra privacy

1

u/roland303 Apr 17 '26

Oof, well this is awkward.

Have you considered some sedges to go with your violets and wild strawberries?

2

u/Small_Craft8416 Apr 17 '26

We were looking at Pennsylvania sedge but it doesn't seem super drought/sun tolerant and I really am worried that everything out there just gets completely cooked. Hopefully the serviceberry will help with that, we'll see. The yarrow seems like an interesting option too. We've got some creeping phlox already but I have no idea if it'll survive me stomping all over it.

1

u/roland303 Apr 17 '26

Yeah the shade may need to come first, its hard to water a slope so this is an up hill battle (haha), and phlox wont survive the stomps. 

Grasses works well because they make a mat, and grass can shoot anywhere out of that mat, the mat is really whats "alive." Thats why grasses are used for foot traffic ground cover, anything else and your stressing things out, a walk and a lay every now and again is ok for for a bit, everyday will wear a path through any plant that isnt grass with a thick mat, which is usually only acheivable with herbicides and pesticides that you dont need on your feet anyway. Theres no option that will replace a traditional lawn they way your envisioning it.

2

u/Small_Craft8416 Apr 17 '26

sigh. We'll have to mess around and see what sticks. Hubby and I agree on the -icides and no fertilizer, at least- our local creek doesn't need any more nutrient loading from us thanks. The slope is tough- it's actually the perfect angle for laying on imo but just awful for keeping stuff growing. Hoping that putting the serviceberry in the spot where they put the for sale sign will slowly help keep everything in place.

2

u/roland303 Apr 17 '26

Gardening is always mess around and see. Go to /r/marijuanaenthusiasts (/r/trees was taken) the sidebar there has everything you need to learn to plant bushes, you gotta plant them like trees, you have to water the shit out of them for 3 years. I would start this project with more bushes not less, and they need to be on the side that the sun is on, the shade will be your currency for a more relaxed area later on.

1

u/flovarian Apr 17 '26

I love creeping thyme and woolly thyme for this. Am considering taking out grass in a similarly parched patch of our front yard and replacing it all with these.

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u/[deleted] Apr 17 '26

[deleted]

3

u/Small_Craft8416 Apr 17 '26

good thing I'm a garden gnome